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Insurance incentives for safe farms.

Agriculture has long been recognized to be a hazardous profession. Within the past decade, increasing attention has been paid to quantifying and correcting these hazards. Traditionally, efforts designed to correct the risk associated with agriculture have included the triad of education, engineering, and enforcement. These approaches have unquestionably been a very important means of addressing the problems of injuries and medical illness linked to work on farms. However, limiting interventions to engineering innovations, education and enforcement of regulations is not sufficient. Education efforts, while very imporant, have not been proven to be effective. Engineering innovations such as follover protective structures on tractors have been important for the reduction of injuries and fatalities but are not in place on mny pieces of older equipment. Enforcement of safety regulations have traditionally not had a large impact on the family farm. Farms with ten or fewer employees are currently effectively exempt from OSHA regulations governing safety practices in agriculture.